ASTRAL PROJECTIONS CARRIED OUT IN AFRICAN MAGIC

 

 

 

On this matter, the expert in African magic, Miad Hoyora Korahon, related the following:

 

« The African natives call "sorcerers" and "witches" to individuals who have "the power to change their skin at will," and this phrase is the local expression used by the natives to refer to the fact that these people have the ability to project his astral body, which is said to be an acquirable faculty, but which is also hereditary in many families.

 

And it is also said that all renowned practitioners of Obeah magic can do everything that witches do, and therefore that they are able to keep witches at bay.

 

Generally, this unfolding operation is supposed to be carried out after dark and always in a cool and unfrequented place.

 

 

So first the witch undresses completely, and having placed herself in a comfortable position, she sings a song, at the end of which she "changes her skin," that is, her physical body remains unconscious, while with her astral body she moves freely.

 

And the individual can then become invisible at will, or assume the form of any person or thing she wishes, and is also able to fly through the air and pass through walls and other obstacles without difficulty.

 

The normal form of the “skinless warlock,” when visible, is compared to an egg-shaped mass of dim light. And all the descriptions I have heard (and there are many) compare this luminosity to the phosphorescence of decaying fish or rotting wood, when seen in the dark.

 

This luminosity is further described as forming a kind of semi-transparent mist envelope, through which if one is close enough, the characteristics and shape of the individual can be recognized, only the size being somewhat smaller than in its ordinary corporeal form.

 

And among the descriptions I have heard about this appearance, the following is one of the most striking:

 

« Recently, at night five men were rowing across the sea from a bay to go towards a large village.

 

When they were about a mile from their destination, they saw a mass of faint light coming toward them at a height of about eight feet above the water.

 

The men were very afraid at first, since they did not know what it was, but that luminous mass passed over their heads, and then they realized that it was a man who moved through the air as if he were floating, or rather as if he “swims” through the air moving his limbs.

 

Then they knew quite well who it was, but they did not confess to having recognized the person. However, in that village there are at least two men and several women who are attributed with more or less frequent actions of this type. »

 

 

 

 

The witches

 

The most feared are the women who practice this “witchcraft”, and in particular the old women whom the natives look at as witches used to be looked at in Europe; and the "tricks" for which they are most feared are those they are accused of performing unseen (i.e., in their astral form).

 

The "tricks" they are usually accused of are two:

 

-        Entering houses at night invisibly when people are asleep and sucking their blood.

-        And “draw the shadow” of small children.

 

1) It has been proven that on some occasions there has been blood sucking, since traces of blood have been found on the bed, on the clothes and on the floor, but there is nothing to prove that the witches did it. And so, so far that accusation seems to be more of a "superstitious belief."

 

And from a scientific point of view, there are no bats in this area, but there are on a neighboring island that is only separated from it by a strait about seventeen miles wide. There, bats are quite common and do a lot of damage, sucking the blood of both humans and animals. And from time to time very large bats have been killed here, and one night a few weeks ago, at a friend's house, one was killed in my presence, and from its appearance, I have no doubt that it was one of those undesirables species.

 

2) As for “drawing the shadow” it sounds like an element of quaint old world mischief. And here it means extracting the shadow (astral form?) of a child. But whatever effect that procedure may have, I have not been able to learn practical details of the modus operandi .

 

What the natives have told me is that when a witch wants to hurt a family, she chooses the last baby born as the most vulnerable point, and normally before the child turns one year old she carries out her attack.

 

It is said that by some as yet unexplained procedure, the witch extracts the child's shadow, and the result is that the child becomes distressed, refuses to eat, and soon dies. But it is also alleged that the witch can reverse this curse by kissing and rocking the child, thus restoring her shadow, with which the child quickly recovers.

 

This story is quite suggestive to me. It reminds me of a strange German romance called "Peter Schimmell" (or a similar name), by Adalbert V. Chamisso, about a person who sold his shadow to the devil, and if I remember correctly, made a good deal with that transaction .

 

And it also reminds me of a very famous master of antiquity, who is said to have cast no shadow when he walked outside, probably because on such occasions there was nothing corporeal enough about him to cast one.

 

And it also reminds me of a photographer, who had been in Arabia, and who told me that some people there flatly refused to be photographed because by doing so, the photographer would imprison their shadows and thereby gain magical power over them.

 

And perhaps these people knew the story told of Nimrood who was once desirous of harming a king, and for this purpose placed a portrait of the king before him, and by continually contemplating his face and exercising his power of will, affected the king's health so seriously that he ended up dying.

 

 

 

And another interesting anecdote that I have been told about the procedure of changing the skin through the use of a spell was the following:

 

« One day in 1875, at the parish school, the children went out to lunch and they were all sitting in the shade of a tree.

 

A girl of about 8 years old named JB, said that she had forgotten to bring her lunch, but that if the others gave her some of theirs, she would show them how her grandmother (with whom she lived) changed her skin when she was going crazy.

 

The children agreed and after having eaten the girl moved away a little and told them to watch her.

 

First he undressed and then sat on the grass and began to sing a song whose words were not understood by his audience. The song didn't last long before the singer lay down to her full length on the grass, and as the last words left her lips, two little JBs appeared before them: one standing and the other lying down.

 

The children were very scared and ran to tell the teacher, but by the time the teacher arrived at the scene, only one JB remained, sitting calmly on the grass, with her clothes on. And since the grandmother was a witch with a bad reputation, the teacher sent JB to her house with instructions not to return. »

 

 

JB is still alive and grown up, and I have met about ten eyewitnesses to that event. And all the narratives of the act of “changing the skin” have a strong general resemblance to this story that I just told you, and it would seem that the use of the “spell” here replaces the use of “projection powders” (that is, drugs).that are used in other regions.

 

Or the strong mental effort that occult students have to make who rehearse this operation by the process prescribed in Eastern esotericism and which imposes all the tension on the will of the practitioner when he is not assisted by a personal guide.

 

 

 

 

Defense against witches

 

The natives employ various methods to avoid the evils supposedly done by witches, and one of the most common is to draw around a house a wide chalk line, or a circle of chalk crosses, which are frequently redrawn because It is popularly believed that no witch inside or outside the skin can cross a chalk line.

 

And the Obeahmen (that is, the practitioners of Obeah magic) are considered to be able to counteract the witches, so parents bring their children to the Obeahmen to be "washed", so that no sorcerer or other evil power can affect them. And the water that is used on those occasions to wet the children is a decoction of roots and other substances whose ingredients I still do not know, if there are any particular ingredients.

 

And it is said that the Obeahmen of past times used a kind of ceremony to capture witches when they were "skinless", and in part that ritual consisted of the Obeahman, upon detecting the witch, drawing a small circle of chalk on the ground and projected a blow towards the witch with a sharp knife or other weapon, and the movement of the blow was to continue towards the ground until the weapon became stuck inside the circle.

 

This forced the witch to enter the circle and materialize, thus remaining at the mercy of the Obeahman until she was allowed to leave. But this operation is currently considered to be "among the lost arts."

 

Today it is said that complete control over a witch can be gained by finding and taking possession of her "skin" (that is, her physical body), as is reported to have happened to the "swan maidens" and "men." wolf" from Norse mythology, in similar situations.

 

And as mentioned before, skinless warlocks can assume any form they wish; and there are stories where it is said that they have taken the form of other people; but there are also stories where it is said that they have taken the form of animals.

 

Like for example:

 

« On a neighboring island, an individual who was wanted by the police had been chased to a dead end, but surprisingly he disappeared and in his place a large black dog appeared, which flew towards the police officers and directed them. And it was previously reported that the same individual had escaped from the prison gang under a similar metamorphosis. »

 

And many are the similar stories that have reached my ears about witches and Obeahmen turning into wild cats, snakes, rocks, ant nests, etc. And although there is surely a lot of imagination in it, there is probably also an undercurrent of truth based on the transformation that these individuals manage to effect with the astral body.

 

However, nothing of that kind has yet come within the scope of my own investigations, and I imagine that even in real cases, an eyewitness would find it very difficult to distinguish between a true transformation, and a mental spell where one he made the witness believe that there was such a transformation.

 

 

 

 

The sorcerers

 

And having told you about witches, let me also give you an example of what I have been told about sorcerers.

 

« In August of last year, I was staying in a nearby city, and one night I went to visit my friend Dr. R who had invited me to dinner, but when I arrived, he was absent, so I waited for him.

 

Shortly afterward he arrived and apologized for keeping me waiting, saying that he had been called unexpectedly to see a patient. After dinner, he told me that I might be interested in hearing some details about the case he had handled and that he would like to hear my opinion on it.

 

He had been called to calm a colored woman (a widow, about 35 years old) who was suffering from a severe nervous shock, which she explained by telling him that she had been awake in bed the night before, when she suddenly started when she saw him enter his bedroom, apparently through the window, to a lame, bad-tempered black man who lived nearby named J.

 

The man began to advance towards her with the obvious intention of abusing her. However, she grabbed a jug of water and threw it at him. And apparently she hit him in the waist, but the jug went through him and smashed against the wall, while the man quickly disappeared.

 

The woman said the man had threatened and worried her before, but not to that extent. And Dr. R added that her patient was weak and suffering from some severe fright, but that there was nothing in her condition that would cause hallucinations, and he did not know what to make of that story that she had told him counted.

 

I gave him my opinion as he had requested (which was that this individual had split) but Dr. R, being a very incredulous man, naturally maintained that my explanation was very dubious. On the other hand, I did see it as very feasible and my only doubt was whether the patient had really experienced it or if she had imagined it.

 

But that dissipated the next morning when I met Dr. P, who was a professional rival of my friend.

 

I asked Dr. P. where he had been, and he told me that he had gone to visit a lame man named J who had cut himself badly in the groin about two days ago “when he fell among some broken glass,” in his words. But as Dr. P himself pointed out, the groin was an unusual place to land, and it was curious that he couldn't find glass shards in the wounds, which were deep! »

 

 

This is an example of the uses made by witches who are capable of unfolding. And this is one of the gentlest uses that the wicked would put to such power, if the mode of effecting it became more popularly known.

 

 

 

 

The use of trees

 

The “Silk-Cotton” tree (Bombax Ceiba), which is not uncommon here closely resembles its East Indian congener the “Simal.” It grows to a great height and size, and supports itself by immense buttresses thrown out from its root. This tree is the one which, in this part of the world, represents to the black man a combination of the affinities ascribed by the natives of India to the Pipal and the Seris trees, besides other qualities.

 

Few black men can be induced to fell one of these trees, and that only when supplied with rum rum, part of which is librated to the “spirit” of the tree, and (the greater) part drunk; the sacrifice of a fowl at the foot of the tree is generally also a requisite, and then the felling proceeds amid profuse apologies to the “spirit” who is supposed to inhabit it.

 

Besides being the habitation of some sort of (elemental?) spirit, (which is generally described as a white woman frequently with a child in her arms, and another on foot beside her) to which the (Methodist Christian) black men are continually offering food, cloth, etc., on the sky: the Silk-Cotton tree is of great importance to Hags.

 

Its height, the shape of its huge branches, the hollows formed by buttresses, and perhaps other points, combine to make it a safe and suitable place for a Hag to change his or her skin in, and in which to have the empty skin or body. Also, several very large specimens of this tree in different parts of the country, are believed to be the meeting places of the Hags, when they gather from time to time “to consult or to told their sabbats.

 

Only the other day, it was reported to me that the night before, one of these trees, a few miles from my house, had been seen occupied by over a dozen ‘balls of fire,’ each of which was a Hag; but I regret to say I did not witness the occurrence.

 

To the smoke of tinder made from the decayed wood of the Silk-Cotton tree, is attributed the power of instantaneously turning sick and killing Hags (whether m or out of their skins) who are brought in contact with it but it does not appear to be frequently made use of for that purpose.

 

The operations of Hags are believed to be in some way influenced by the moon and the ‘Yellow Sandus’ tree (Bocida Capitata) which, when dressed is said by the black men to vary its color with the changes of the moon, is stated to be used by Hags for some purpose, as yet unknown to me.

 

But, I have had the curiosity to have a piece of that wood planed up, and have now had it under observation for some months, without perceiving any variation of color whatever during that time. »

(Theosophist, May 1891, p.474-479)